by BGF | Aug 26, 2018 | News
The AIWS Standards and Practice Committee welcomes the two newest members: Professor Jason Furman and President Marc Rotenberg.
The Committee is responsible for:
- Updating and collecting information on threats and potential harm posed by AI.
- Connecting companies, universities, and governments to find ways to prevent threats and potential harm.
- Engaging in the audit of behaviors and decisions in the creation of AI.
- Creating both an Index and Report about AI threats – and identifying the source of threats.
- Creating a Report on respect for, and application of, ethics codes and standards of governments, companies, universities, individuals and all others…
There are 21 members of AIWS Standards and Practice Committee found by Michael Dukakis. Recently, the board has welcomed two innovative leaders to AIWS Standards and Practice Committee.
The first one is the professor of the Practice of Economic Policy at Harvard Kennedy School (HKS) — Prof. Jason Furman. He is also nonresident senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. This followed eight years as a top economic adviser to President Obama, including serving as the 28th Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers from August 2013 to January 2017, acting as both President Obama’s chief economist and a member of the cabinet.
The second is Mr. Marc Rotenberg, President of the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), an independent public interest research organization in Washington, DC. Professor Rotenberg has served on advisory panels for the American Bar Association Section on Criminal Justice, the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the Institute of Medicine (IOM), the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), the National Academy of Science (NAS), the Organization of American States (OAS), UNESCO, and the OECD. He is a former chair of the Public Interest Registry, which established and manages the .ORG domain.
by BGF | Aug 26, 2018 | News
On July 8th, 2018 Em Tech by MIT Technology invited Manuela Maria Veloso to discuss the capabilities of AI systems nowadays and to make predictions regarding the future of AI.
Manuela Maria Veloso is the Head of the Machine Learning Department at Carnegie Mellon University & Herbert A. Simon University Professor in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. She discussed in her speech the current situation of robots—including the fact that there are now examples of AI in most of our devices (e.g., cellphones, computers with censors, cognitive systems).
However, she pointed out, there are also not many actual mobile robots around us. And robots nowadays are typically only equipped with cameras as a visual sensor. A challenge for mobile machines, then, is the fact that they must process the sensory data and use it to make decisions. Furthermore, mobile machines usually encounter uncertainties in making decisions with the actual state regarding stocks, weather, direction… but they will be more certain as they collect more data to make decision faster.
One possible solution is to enable AI to ask humans for help, a practice demonstrated at Carnegie Mellon by a robot tasked with fetching a cup of coffee. While it could not do all physical activities, it ask for human or other machines’ help in executing the task. In the future, to enhance human – AI interaction, Prof. Manuela Maria Veloso emphasized the need to create transparency, as robots are programmed in code, which “is a cryptic to human”. A current obstacle, known as verbalization, is the need to translate this code into natural language. A system enables machine to verbalize its activities and data processing.
If feasible, this would be a major development for robots. According to the first layer in MDI’s 7-layer model—a set of ethical standards for AI—it is vital that automation and intelligence are transparent so that human can understand a robot’s movements and actions.
by BGF | Aug 26, 2018 | News
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projected that banks will eliminate more than 40,000 jobs in 10 years, through 2026. Yet, banks also raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
As the technology develops, bank tellers are increasing expected to lose their jobs to automation. Howoever, their wages have actually risen this year, as customers are increasingly using mobile phones for financial services and tellers are needed to help customers navigate these services. Tellers are taught to pitch loans, guide local entrepreneurs, and offer technical support. “They have to solve problems like my PayPal doesn’t work, or my Venmo doesn’t work, or why doesn’t Uber accept my card?’’ said Christopher Maher, chief executive officer of Ocean First Financial Corp., New Jersey’s fourth-largest lender.
As reported by Bloomberg, Ocean First, for example, created a nine-week course for staff on payment platforms to bring about 500 tellers to assist customers with financial decisions. The way bankers help others has also changed as well. Now users can experience a video teller — a remote teller that can perform services available online. Video teller machines look like ATMs — but with the option of pushing a button and connecting to a human. One teller can support up to 10 machines.
Of course, AI is just a tool, and it is essential for people to learn how to use AI for their benefit. The importance of AI applications in some key sectors such as finance and banking is the focus of Layer 7 of the AIWS 7-Layer Model.
by BGF | Aug 26, 2018 | News
Elon Musk, the chairman and chief executive of the electric-car maker Tesla, tweeted his intention to take his company private at $420 a share. The message has drawn the attention of Tesla’s stakeholders.
His tweet started a chain reaction with the involvement of investors, Tesla board members and the stock market.
The New York Times had an hour-long interview with Mr. Musk, answering questions relevant to his Twitter post. Mr. Musk said that he had been working 120 hours a week lately, and had not taken more than a week of since 2001. “There were times when I didn’t leave the factory for three or four days — days when I didn’t go outside,” he said. “This has really come at the expense of seeing my kids. And seeing friends.” His restless pace of work was taking a toll on his mental as well as physical health. In the interview, he also blamed the short-sellers and analysts who he said put pressure on him, by promoting a narrative about Tesla’s loss after the Model 3 mass-market declaration. He occasionally had to take Ambien, a hypnotic primarily used for the short-term treatment of sleeping problems.
Worried about him, Tesla executives have attempted to find a chief operating officer or other No. 2 executive to share the burden with Mr. Musk. But Mr. Musk stated that there was no active search at the moment, and he had no intention of relinquishing his role as chairman, saying his commitment to his company remains strong.
by BGF | Aug 26, 2018 | News
For years, politicians have had concerns about cyber issues being used for warfare. However, cyber issues has been proved to be more of a confusion-causing tool, which leads to economic disruption.
Joseph S. Nye, Jr, who was the former US assistant secretary of defense and chairman of the US National Intelligence Council, and now a professor at Harvard University, Member of Board of Thinkers of The Boston Global Forum, expressed his consternation of a potential devil-cyber system: “A doctrine for hybrid warfare that blends conventional weapons, economic coercion, information operations, and cyber-attacks” as described by Russian chief of the general staff Valery Gerasimov.
To demonstrate his point of view, Prof. Joseph Nye used many prime examples of the damage caused by cyber.attacks In December 2015, for example, Russian hackers successfully carried out the first cyberattack on the Ukrainian power grid, compromising information systems of three energy distribution companies and disrupting electricity supply to consumers. Social media is thought to be the perfect instrument for sowing confusion, as was seen in the 2016 U.S. presidential election. Several measures are suggested to address the situation, the most important of which is that the US must be aware of the potential for cyber-attacks, particularly those that involve the manipulation of social media.
